Blythe and Petit Blythe

Monday, August 25th, 2008

In 1972 a bizarre big headed character was introduced into the toy  market. Blythe was a new doll by the American company Kenner (which has since merged with Hasbro), with eyes that changed colour and a distinctive large face . She was an instant ….flop. She was discontinued and forgotten about for 30 years - except by the occasional doll collector, one of whom was a photographer called Gina Garan, who produced a fun series of photos of a Blythe doll in different locations, and kicked off a whole new craze.

 Following the success of her collection of pictures, published as “This Is Blythe”, vintage Blythes shot up in price. Japanese department store Parco produced a limited edition of Blythes, and used the doll in their 2000 Christmas advertising campaign leading to the doll becoming a cult in Japan, with top designers such as Issey Miyake eager to contribute to exhibitions and gallery shows featuring this new cute but odd looking icon. In 2001 Japanese toy company Takara manufactured the first of the new series of Blythes, (sometimes referred to as ‘Neo-Blythe’ to distinguish them from the original ‘Vintage Blythe’)
The next year Takara launched the half-size model Petit Blythe

Smaller and cheaper than the full-size doll, Petit Blythe is a less costly way to get into collecting, sized to fit in a bag or put on your school desk.

Since then there has been 3 different bodies, over 50 full-sized Blythes and another 100 Petit-Blythes.

You can buy Petit Blythe at happyhappytoytoy.com

Tags: blythe, doll, fashion dolls
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